Steelers receiver Antonio Brown has said goodbye to Pittsburgh, but the Steelers have yet to say goodbye to Brown. One prominent reporter who covers the team believes they should.
Ed Bouchette of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, appearing Wednesday morning on PFT Live, argued that the Steelers should take whatever they can get in trade for Brown, accepting the best offer on the table before his $2.5 million roster bonus becomes due on March 17.
Bouchette believes the Steelers should trade Brown, even if the compensation consists of a conditional seventh-round pick in 2020.
It wouldn’t be the first time the Steelers sold low when it comes to a star receiver. In 2010, four years after Santonio Holmes arrived via round one and two years after he became the MVP of Super Bowl XLIII, the Steelers dumped Holmes onto the Jets for a fifth-round draft pick after news emerged of a four-game suspension for violating the league’s substance-abuse policy.
A sixth-round pick the same year Holmes was traded, Brown is now on the verge of being gone. Given the various distractions and persistent dysfunction with which the Steelers have been dealing in recent months, it makes sense for both sides to get a fresh start.